Chapter Sixteen Razor
chapter sixteen
Razor
I stepped out of Lennon’s shower with a towel knotted low around my waist and stopped short at the door to my room.
Well, it wasn’t my room. It was Lennon’s boys’ room.
But the twin beds were neatly made, the thin duvet smoothed out, the space made temporary-liveable.
Can’t say it was the best night’s sleep I’d had, but the beds were a fuck lot better than the shit I’d been sleeping on of late.
Though the problem wasn’t the bed, it was what was laid out on one of them.
The only clothes I owned were prison issue. And I couldn’t wear them. Not today.
I’d never been a bloke with much stuff. Growing up broke does that.
Teaches you early that things are for using, not keeping.
Even when the money started coming in, when the streets paid better than any legit graft ever would, most of it didn’t stay with me.
It went to Mum. Keeley. To rent. Food. Fixing whatever was about to fall apart next.
Hadn’t even paid for the car I used to drive. That had been a gift from Cormac.
Fuck knew where it was now.
Impounded. Stripped. Crawled over. Maybe already flattened into a cube of metal and evidence.
So yeah. I’d never had much. Clothes had always been about function.
Clean enough. Dark enough. Replaceable. But standing there, damp and smothered in Lennon’s shampoo and shower gel, staring down at the grey jumper and joggers I’d been wearing for months inside, a realisation struck hard and furious.
I didn’t want to put them back on.
Ever.
But I didn’t have any of my own stuff as I couldn’t go back to the Wick apartment.
That would be like walking straight into a waiting gun.
So I turned and padded down the hall to Lennon’s room.
He was halfway into his work gear, hi-vis folded neatly on the bed, socks bunched in his hands.
I rapped my knuckles on the doorframe. He looked up and took me in, from feet to face, stopping on the ink laid bare.
Tattoos that had always been there to remind me of what I was—poison, warning signs etched into skin—now read differently in the quiet light of his room.
Marks of a man I’d been, not the one I was trying, maybe clumsily, to become.
“Could I… borrow some gear?” I asked. “For today.”
He straightened. Didn’t make a joke straight off. He knew my anxiety about where I was heading.
“Sure.” He gestured to the wardrobe. “Help yourself.”
I crossed the room and opened it; the smell of clean laundry and sawdust drifted out. I rummaged through, pulling out a jumper. Then put it back. Got a shirt. Too small. Another. Too tight. Too me. Or who I’d been.
Lennon came up behind me. “It’s a consultation.” He smacked me on the back of my head. “Not a date.”
I flipped him off without turning. But he smiled when he passed me, and there was something softer in it than usual. More like relief. Because he could see it too. I wasn’t trying to get dressed. I was trying to show up as someone new.
We’d talked properly the night before. The two of us.
Something we hadn’t done in… I don’t even know how long.
Forever. With a can of beer between us and a bag of chips going cold on the table, we’d gone right back to the beginning.
To when things between me and Levi changed.
When wanting him stopped being simple. When it got tangled and dangerous.
I even told him about that night. When Levi had begged me for coke.
Said he wanted to try being with me high.
That it would be better, less clumsy. And how I hadn’t been strong enough to say no.
I’d given him something that I was sure had been clean, and how that single choice sat heavy in my gut because not long after, he was dead.
And I told him the part I’d never said out loud: that the guilt had been eating me alive ever since.
I’d never told Lennon about me and Levi before because it felt as if I’d be overstepping his grief. He’d lost a brother. I wasn’t about to make him share the weight of my part in it. So I swallowed it. Let him grieve cleanly. And somewhere along the way, that silence built a wall between us.
That was how we drifted.
I told him about the men after. The ones that meant nothing. Transactional. Easy. Empty. Then I told him about Tristan.
All of it.
He listened. The way he’d promised he would all those months ago.
No judgement. No flinching. A steady, patient attention.
And somehow, in saying it out loud, I felt myself loosen.
My bravado slip. The act of pretending I wasn’t drowning in feelings I didn’t have the words for suddenly became too much.
Lennon had the words for how I felt.
I chose not to use them. Not yet.
Because however long it took before I stood in a witness box, Tristan would only be in my life professionally. That was the line. The only safe one.
Still.
Didn’t mean I didn’t want to look good when I saw him.
So I thanked fuck Lennon and I were roughly the same build and pulled on a pair of his jeans, a plain white tee, then hesitated before adding one of his thick knitted cardigan things.
Totally not my style, but I could hide my hands in it if it all got a bit too much.
Then I checked myself in the full-length mirror.
Pushed up the sleeves once. Then rolled them down.
Then raked my fingers through my hair, roughing it up enough not to look as if I’d tried.
Once set, I blew out a jagged breath, fogging the glass.
I reckon I could pass for homely in this get-up.
I snorted. Me? Homely? Get a fucking grip, bruv.
The beep from outside cut through the moment. Time was up. So I jogged downstairs and stepped out into the cold where a black cab waited at the kerb, courtesy of Andrew Mercer, authorised route already logged by my ankle tab. I slid into the back seat and gave the address.
London moved past the windows in familiar pieces, but it still felt new.
Different. Bridges, traffic, people going about their lives as if mine hadn’t been cracked clean open.
The tag itched under my sock, a quiet reminder that even this was conditional.
That every turn the cab took had been approved.
Logged. Watched. Then when we pulled up outside the Temple precinct, my heart ticked a little faster.
I stepped out, walking through the archway into Temple Crown Chambers.
Tristan’s world.
It didn’t look the way I’d imagined it would.
No marble floors. No looming sense of judgement.
Just carpet that had seen better years, walls lined with framed cases, and the smell of burnt coffee hanging in the air as if it had given up trying to leave.
It felt… functional. Which somehow made it worse.
This was a place where decisions got made. Where lives were redirected.
Tristan was waiting in reception.
And fuck, my chest flipped.
He looked good. Really fucking good. Light grey suit cut perfectly to him, white shirt crisp, shiny silver tie catching the light and drawing the eye to his golden hair.
Neat. Controlled. Polished in a way that made him look elegant.
Untouchable. He belonged to this world in a way I never would. Not even in this cardigan.
“Mr Slade.” He nodded, professional, gesturing for me to follow.
He didn’t smile. No hint of recognition going beyond client and counsel.
I’d expected that, needed it even, but something about it felt wrong.
He walked as if holding something in. Shoulders set.
Jaw tight. A fraction too rigid. I knew better than to pretend I knew every version of him, every tell, every fault line.
I didn’t. But I knew men who were wound tight and determined no one notice.
I’d seen it before. And usually, it was because I was paying them a visit.
So as we moved through the corridors, I drifted a step closer and dropped my voice. “You alright?”
He gave a single, clipped nod. “Mm.”
That was it.
Then he showed me into the meeting room.
Imogen Barrett KC was already there.
“Mr Slade.” She gestured to the chair opposite her. “Please, sit.”
I did.
The chair was solid, uncomfortable in a way that felt intentional.
Tristan took the seat to my right, and I could feel the heat coming off him.
Not the good kind. Not warmth. Tension. Sitting tight under his skin.
I’d spent enough time on the streets reading men to know when something was off.
I’d learnt to clock danger early or paid for it later.
I knew the faint shift before a temper snapped.
The fractional stillness meaning someone was holding too much inside.
Tristan had all that about him then.
Mercer to my left, set out the files, pen in hand, ready.
“This meeting is legally privileged,” Imogen said, closing the folder in front of her with quiet finality. “Nothing you say here leaves this room unless you authorise it. Do you understand?”
“Yeah.”
“This is also the point at which you confirm you wish us to continue acting for you. Through the plea hearing and, if necessary, a full trial.”
I could feel Tristan angled beside me. Solid.
Too close. I remembered what he’d said: that if he was my brief, I wasn’t to touch him anymore.
That whatever this thing between us was, it had to stop at the door.
Professional only. No blurred lines. No moments that could tear the case apart. Or his career.
I glanced at him.
He looked up. There was the faintest nod. Barely there. But it was enough.
“Yeah.” I turned back to Imogen. “I do.”
“Good.” Imogen inclined her head and nodded to Mercer, who tapped something into his laptop. The official mark, I guessed. Me becoming theirs. Properly.